Scalable notification delivery service

ABSTRACT

A notification service that efficiently scales to the number and variety of notifications and users being serviced. The notification service is separated into three general functional components. A listener component receives a notification in a network format suitable for transmitting the notification over a network. The listener component translates the notification into an internal processing format used by the notification service. The notification is then forwarded to a routing component that determines a category associated with the notification, and performs a set of one or more operations on the notification based on its category. Finally, the notification service is forwarded to a delivery service for delivery of the notification to the notification sink. The listener component, the routing component, and the delivery component may each be scaled in order to adjust for current processing loads using load balancing functionality.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No.10/086,792, filed Feb. 28, 2002, and entitled “SCALABLE NOTIFICATIONDELIVERY SERVICE” and which is incorporated herein by reference.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. The Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to the field of notification technology.Specifically, the present invention relates to methods, systems andcomputer program products for delivering notifications in a manner thatefficiently scales to the number and variety of notifications and usersbeing serviced by the notifications.

2. Background and Related Art

Most would agree that intelligent decision-making requires access torelevant and timely information. Computer networking has greatlyenhanced our ability to access such information, resulting in thismodern era often being termed “the information age”.

Some access to information is synchronous or “pull-oriented”. In otherwords, information is accessed each time a request for the informationis submitted. For example, users may use Internet-enabled computers torequest access to information such as Web pages, e-mail accounts,calendaring applications, or the like. In this manner, synchronousaccess allows for broad control over the type of information accessed.

There are some cases in which it may be inefficient to synchronouslyaccess information. For example, some information changes relativelyoften. A user may desire to know the current information despite suchfrequent changes. It that case, synchronous access would requirefrequent requests for updated information. Such information may include,for example, stock prices. In addition, perhaps the user does not careabout the information unless the information has a certain value. Forexample, perhaps a user is not interested in a certain fifteen-yearmortgage rate unless the value drops below a threshold percentage, atwhich time the user may consider refinancing. In this case, synchronousaccess might result in numerous requests for updated information even ifthe interest rate was not yet low enough to be interesting to the user.

In order to avoid these inefficiencies, computer networks may also beused to implement notifications in which a user subscribes to benotified upon the occurrence of predetermined events. If the eventoccurs, the notification is dispatched to the user without the userneeding to request each notification. Such communication is often termedasynchronous or “push-oriented” since there need not be a user-issuedrequest before each notification.

Due to the number of users and devices that have subscribed tonotifications, there are a large number of notifications that traversevarious networks. Accordingly, what is desired are methods, systems, andcomputer program products for delivering notifications in a manner thatscales to the current number and variety of notifications delivered andusers served, and that delivers notification in an efficient manner.Also, since the number of notifications delivered and users served issubject to change with time, what is desired are methods, systems, andcomputer program products that scale notification delivery in anefficient manner.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Methods, systems, and computer program products are described forproviding notifications in a manner that efficiently scales to thenumber and variety of notifications and users being serviced. Thepresent invention may be implemented in a network environment thatincludes one or more notification sources where notifications aregenerated in response to an event. The network environment also includesone or more notification sinks to which the generated notifications areto be sent. The notifications traverse a notification service inaccordance with the present invention on their way from the notificationsources to the notification sinks. The network environment may be, forexample, the Internet.

In one example environment, the notifications may be mobile-originated,in which case the notification sources are wireless devices and thenotification sinks are mobile service providers that serve a variety ofmobile devices. However, the notifications may also be mobile-terminatedin which case the notification sources may be mobile service providersor other notification sources, while the wireless devices may be thenotification sinks. At a high-level, the notification service performssimilar operations for both mobile-originated and mobile-terminatednotifications.

The notification service includes a listener component that receives anotification in a network format suitable for transmitting thenotification over a network. The listener component receives thenotification and translates the notification into an internal processingformat used by the notification service. In one example, the networkformat is an HTTP post request that has the notification content in thebody of the HTTP post request. The notification content may bestructured within an XML document either directly in the HTTP postrequest, or perhaps within a SOAP envelope within the HTTP post request.

The notification is then forwarded to a routing component thatdetermines a category associated with the notification, and performs aset of one or more operations on the notification based on its category.Such categories of notifications may include instant messages, news,mobile-originated, or any other conceivable category. Each category hasone or more associated operations or transforms that may be performed onnotifications of that category. Such transforms include a user profileacquisition, an authorization, an advertisement insertion, a messagelimit check, a mute check to determine if the notification should bemuted, or the like. Finally, the notification service is forwarded to adelivery service for delivery of the notification to the notificationsink.

These categorizations of notifications (along with an identification ofthe corresponding transforms to be performed for notifications of eachcategory) may be stored in a configuration XML document. By makingslight changes to the configuration XML document (e.g., by adding orediting nodes in the XML document), one may add different categories ofnotifications, and edit the transforms that are performed for eachcategory of notifications. Thus, the notification service efficientlyscales to different types of notifications.

The listener component, the routing component, and the deliverycomponent may each be scaled in order to adjust for current processingloads. Thus, there may be any number of listener components, routingcomponents, and delivery components. The listener components may haveload balancing functionality to determine which of several similarrouting components to send the notification to. Likewise, the routingcomponents may have load balancing to determine which of several similardelivery components to send the notification to.

Accordingly, the principles of the present invention provide for anefficiently scalable notification service. Additional features andadvantages of the invention will be set forth in the description thatfollows, and in part will be obvious from the description, or may belearned by the practice of the invention. The features and advantages ofthe invention may be realized and obtained by means of the instrumentsand combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims. Theseand other features of the present invention will become more fullyapparent from the following description and appended claims, or may belearned by the practice of the invention as set forth hereinafter.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

In order to describe the manner in which the above-recited and otheradvantages and features of the invention can be obtained, a moreparticular description of the invention briefly described above will berendered by reference to specific embodiments thereof, which areillustrated in the appended drawings. Understanding that these drawingsdepict only typical embodiments of the invention and are not thereforeto be considered to be limiting of its scope, the invention will bedescribed and explained with additional specificity and detail throughthe use of the accompanying drawings in which:

FIG. 1 schematically illustrates a suitable computing device that mayimplement the principles of the present invention;

FIG. 2 schematically illustrates a suitable network environment for thepresent invention including notification sources dispatchingnotifications to notification sinks via a notification service;

FIG. 3 illustrates, in simplified form, the components of thenotification service of FIG. 2;

FIG. 4 illustrates a flowchart of a method for delivering notificationsfrom a notification source to a notification sink in accordance with thepresent invention;

FIG. 5 illustrates, in more detailed form, the components of thenotification service of FIG. 2;

FIG. 6 illustrates a flowchart of a muted transform method that may beimplemented by the notification service depending on the category of thenotification;

FIG. 7 illustrates a flowchart of a user profile transform method thatmay be implemented by the notifications service;

FIG. 8 illustrates a flowchart of an authorization transform method;

FIG. 9 illustrates a flowchart of a message limit transform method;

FIG. 10 illustrates a flowchart of an application transform method;

FIG. 11 illustrates a flowchart of a formatting transform method;

FIG. 12 illustrates a flowchart of an advertisement transform method;

FIG. 13 illustrates a load balancing scaling mechanism;

FIG. 14 illustrates the load balancing scaling mechanisms as applied tolistener, router, and delivery transport components used by thenotification service; and

FIG. 15 illustrates a flowchart of a method for delivering notificationsin a scalable manner in accordance with the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

The present invention extends to methods, systems and computer programproducts for providing notifications in a manner that efficiently scalesto the number and variety of notifications and users being serviced. Thepresent invention may be implemented in a network environment such asthe Internet that includes one or more notification sources wherenotifications are generated in response to an event. The networkenvironment also includes one or more notification sinks to which thegenerated notifications are to be sent. The notifications traverse anotification service in accordance with the present invention on theirway from the notification sources to the notification sinks.

The notification service includes a listener component that receives anotification in a network format suitable for transmitting thenotification over a network. The listener component receives thenotification and translates the notification into an internal processingformat used by the notification service. The notification is thenforwarded to a routing component that determines a category associatedwith the notification, and performs a set of one or more operations onthe notification based on its category. Finally, the notificationservice is forwarded to a delivery service for delivery of thenotification to the notification sink.

The listener component, the routing component, and the deliverycomponent may each be scaled in order to adjust for current processingloads. Thus, there may be any number of listener components, routingcomponents, and delivery components. The listener components may haveload balancing functionality to determine which of several similarrouting component to send the notification to. Likewise, the routingcomponents may have load balancing to determine which of several similardelivery components to send the notification to.

Embodiments within the scope of the present invention may comprise aspecial purpose or general purpose computing device including variouscomputer hardware, as discussed in greater detail below. Embodimentswithin the scope of the present invention also include computer-readablemedia for carrying or having computer-executable instructions or datastructures stored thereon. Such computer-readable media can be anyavailable media which can be accessed by a general purpose or specialpurpose computer. By way of example, and not limitation, suchcomputer-readable media can comprise physical storage media such as RAM,ROM, EEPROM, CD-ROM or other optical disk storage, magnetic disk storageor other magnetic storage devices, or any other medium which can be usedto carry or store desired program code means in the form ofcomputer-executable instructions or data structures and which can beaccessed by a general purpose or special purpose computer.

When information is transferred or provided over a network or anothercommunications connection (either hardwired, wireless, or a combinationof hardwired or wireless) to a computer, the computer properly views theconnection as a computer-readable medium. Thus, any such connection isproperly termed a computer-readable medium. Combinations of the aboveshould also be included within the scope of computer-readable media.Computer-executable instructions comprise, for example, instructions anddata which cause a general purpose computer, special purpose computer,or special purpose processing device to perform a certain function orgroup of functions.

Although not required, the invention will be described in the generalcontext of computer-executable instructions, such as program modules,being executed by computing devices. Generally, program modules includeroutines, programs, objects, components, data structures, and the likethat perform particular tasks or implement particular abstract datatypes. Computer-executable instructions, associated data structures, andprogram modules represent examples of the program code means forexecuting steps and acts of the methods disclosed herein.

Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the invention may bepracticed in network computing environments with many types of computersystem configurations, including personal computers, hand-held devices,multi-processor systems, microprocessor-based or programmable consumerelectronics, network PCs, minicomputers, mainframe computers, and thelike. The invention may also be practiced in distributed computingenvironments where tasks are performed by local and remote processingdevices that are linked (either by hardwired links, wireless links, orby a combination of hardwired or wireless links) through acommunications network. In a distributed computing environment, programmodules may be located in both local and remote memory storage devices.

FIG. 1 illustrates an example computing system that may itself or incombination with other computing devices implement all or portions ofprinciples of the present invention. The example system includes ageneral purpose computing device in the form of a conventional computingdevice 120, including a processing unit 121, a system memory 122, and asystem bus 123 that couples various system components including thesystem memory 122 to the processing unit 121. The system bus 123 may beany of several types of bus structures including a memory bus or memorycontroller, a peripheral bus, and a local bus using any of a variety ofbus architectures. The system memory includes read only memory (ROM) 124and random access memory (RAM) 125. A basic input/output system (BIOS)126, containing the basic routines that help transfer informationbetween elements within the computer 120, such as during start-up, maybe stored in ROM 124.

The computer 120 may also include a magnetic hard disk drive 127 forreading from and writing to a magnetic hard disk 139, a magnetic diskdrive 128 for reading from or writing to a removable magnetic disk 129,and an optical disk drive 130 for reading from or writing to removableoptical disk 131 such as a CD-ROM or other optical media. The magnetichard disk drive 127, magnetic disk drive 128, and optical disk drive 130are connected to the system bus 123 by a hard disk drive interface 132,a magnetic disk drive-interface 133, and an optical drive interface 134,respectively. The drives and their associated computer-readable mediaprovide nonvolatile storage of computer-executable instructions, datastructures, program modules and other data for the computer 120.Although the exemplary environment described herein employs a magnetichard disk 139, a removable magnetic disk 129 and a removable opticaldisk 131, other types of computer readable media for storing data can beused, including magnetic cassettes, flash memory cards, digitalversatile disks, Bernoulli cartridges, RAMs, ROMs, and the like.

Program code means comprising one or more program modules may be storedon the hard disk 139, magnetic disk 129, optical disk 131, ROM 124 orRAM 125, including an operating system 135, one or more applicationprograms 136, other program modules 137, and program data 138.

A user may enter commands and information into the computer 120 throughkeyboard 140, pointing device 142, or other input devices (not shown),such as a microphone, joy stick, game pad, satellite dish, scanner, orthe like. These and other input devices are often connected to theprocessing unit 121 through a serial port interface 146 coupled tosystem bus 123. Alternatively, the input devices may be connected byother interfaces, such as a parallel port, a game port or a universalserial bus (USB). A monitor 147 or another display device is alsoconnected to system bus 123 via an interface, such as video adapter 148.In addition to the monitor, personal computers typically include otherperipheral output devices (not shown), such as speakers and printers.

The computer 120 may operate in a networked environment using logicalconnections to one or more remote computers, such as remote computers149 a and 149 b. Remote computers 149 a and 149 b may each be anotherpersonal computer, a server, a router, a network PC, a peer device orother common network node, and typically include many or all of theelements described above relative to the computer 120, although onlymemory storage devices 150 a and 150 b and their associated applicationprograms 136 a and 136 b been illustrated in FIG. 1. The logicalconnections depicted in FIG. 1 include a local, area network (LAN) 151and a wide area network (WAN) 152 that are presented here by way ofexample and not limitation. Such networking environments are commonplacein office-wide or enterprise-wide computer networks, intranets and theInternet.

When used in a LAN networking environment, the computer 120 is connectedto the local network 151 through a network interface or adapter 153.When used in a WAN networking environment, the computer 120 may includea modem 154, a wireless link, or other means for establishingcommunications over the wide area network 152, such as the Internet. Themodem 154, which may be internal or external, is connected to the systembus 123 via the serial port interface 146. In a networked environment,program modules depicted relative to the computer 120, or portionsthereof, may be stored in the remote memory storage device. It will beappreciated that the network connections shown are exemplary and othermeans of establishing communications over wide area network 152 may beused.

FIG. 2 illustrates a network environment 200 in which the principles ofthe present invention may be employed. The network environment 200includes a number of notification sources 201 including, for example,notification sources 201 a and 201 b among potentially many others asrepresented by the horizontal ellipses. These notification sources 201generate notifications in response to a detected event. The networkenvironment 200 also includes a number of notification sinks 202including, for example, notification sinks 202 a and 202 b amongpotentially many others. The notification sinks 202 representapplications or devices that consume notifications generated by thenotification sources 201. While such applications or devices may beconsumer applications and consumer devices, that need not be the case.In one embodiment, the notification sinks 202 represent applications,computers, or devices operated by an intermediary service provider thatacts as a proxy between the notification service 203 and consumerelectronic computers or devices. For example, the notification sink 202may be a cellular provider, a paging company or the like.

The network environment 200 may be any network environment that includesone or more notification sources and one or more notification sinks. Onone extreme, one potential environment is the Internet, which containsenumerable notification sources and sinks. On the other extreme,although two notification sources 201 a and 201 b and two notificationsinks 202 a and 202 b are shown in FIG. 2, the principles of the presentinvention may be employed in a simple network environment that includesa single notification source and/or a single notification sink. Eachnotification source and sink may be a computing device and/or anapplication running thereon.

In accordance with the present invention, a notification service 203facilitates communication of the notification from the notificationsources 201 to the notification sinks 202. The notification service 203performs appropriate processing on the notification as it passes on itsway to its destination notification sink. The kind of processing that isappropriate may vary greatly and depend on the category of thenotification. Examples of such appropriate processing are describedfurther below. In one network environment, the number of notifications,notification sources, notification sinks, and users of notificationsinks may vary greatly over time. Accordingly, the notification service203 also scales efficiently to accommodate such changes as will bedescribed further below.

FIG. 3 schematically illustrates, in simplified form, the variouscomponents of the notification service 203. Referring to FIG. 4, thenotification service 203 performs a method 400 for deliveringnotifications from a notification source to a notifications sink. Thestructure of the notification service 203 of FIG. 3 will be now bedescribed with frequent reference to the method 400 of FIG. 4.

Initially, a listener component 301 receives a notification 304 from oneof notifications sources 201 (act 401). The notification is received ina network format. The network format may be any format that is suitablefor transmission of notifications over a network, whether that format isnow defined or to be developed in the future. Examples of a networkformat include a notification that is structured as an eXtensible MarkupLanguage (XML) document included within the body of a HyperTextTransport Protocol (HTTP) post request. That XML document may also beincluded as the body of a Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) messagethat is itself included within an HTTP post request.

The listener component 301 then translates the notification from thenetwork format into an internal processing format used by thenotification service (act 402). That internal processing format may beany format that is convenient for the notification service 203, whetheror not that internal processing format is also used external to thenotification service.

The notification service 203 then performs a functional step forprocessing the notification based on a category of the notification(step 403). In particular, the step for processing may include acorresponding act of determining a category of the notification (act404), and then a corresponding act of performing a set of zero or moreoperations on the notification in its internal processing format basedon the category of the notification (act 405). The set of zero or moreoperations may usually include at least one operation. However, theremay be circumstances in which no operations are performed onnotifications of a particular category. The delivery component 303 thenreceives the notification for delivery to the notification sink (act406).

The step for processing (step 403) may be performed by the routingcomponent 302, or by a combination of the routing component 302 and thelistener component 301. Additionally, further category-specificprocessing of the notification may occur at the delivery component evenafter the routing component 302 performs its own category-specificprocessing of the notification. Thus, category-specific processing ofthe notification may occur at the listener component 301, the routercomponent 302 and/or at the delivery component 303.

FIG. 5 illustrates, in more detail, the structure of the notificationservice 203. This more specific structure is illustrative only and notlimiting. Those of ordinary skill in the art will recognize, afterhaving reviewed this description, that various structures will becapable of implementing the principles of the present invention.

FIG. 5 illustrates that there may be various types of deliverycomponents 303 that may be used depending on the direction that thenotification is flowing, and based on whether deferred delivery iswarranted. In particular, suppose that the notification sinks arewireless devices. Notifications may be transmitted from a mobile serviceprovider to a mobile device (hereinafter called “mobile-terminatednotifications”), or from a mobile device to a service provider(hereinafter called “mobile-originated notifications”). Either directionmay be facilitated by the structure of FIG. 3 and FIG. 5.

In particular, for mobile-terminated notifications, the mobile serviceprovider is one of the notification sources 201 of FIG. 2, and thewireless device is one of the notification sinks 202. The notificationpasses from the wireless device, to the listener component 301, to therouter component 302, and to one of the delivery components 303. In thecase of mobile-terminated devices, the delivery component 303 is adelivery transport 501 that includes transport modules that may be usedwith the notification sink. Such transport modules may facilitatetransports such as Short Message Service (SMS) and Simple Mail TransferProtocol (SMTP) that may be used by the wireless carrier that transportsthe notification over the wireless network to the wireless device.

For mobile-originated notifications, the wireless device is one of thenotifications sources 201 and the mobile service provider is one of thenotification sinks. For both mobile-terminated and mobile-originatednotifications, the notification passes through the listener component301, through the router component 302, and to one of the deliverycomponents 303. In the case of mobile-originated notifications, however,the delivery component is a mobile service provider such as mobile dataservice 502, rather than the delivery transport. In this case, themobile data service 502 acts as both the delivery component and thenotification sink.

In some cases, it may not be desirable to immediately deliver anotification. For example, the notification sink or the user of thenotification sink may have indicated that she does not want to benotified under certain circumstances. Also, the notification service mayhave detected a failure to deliver the notification. In such cases, thedelivery component (and notification sink) may take the form of adeferral service 503.

The listener component 301, the router component 302, and the deliverytransport 504 all have access to a configuration database 504 thatstores data that is not specific to a user, but is more general to thenotification service 203. For example, the configuration database 504may identify supported carriers and devices, and identifycharacteristics associated with such supported carriers and devices suchas the number of characters that may be displayed on a particularsupported device. A user database 505 stores user-specific informationsuch as account status, user preferences, and user address information.

As mentioned above, the notification service 203 may perform a set ofone or more operations (also called herein “transforms”) on thenotification depending on the caterogy. There are three possible resultsfor each transform; either the notification is dropped, processingcontinues to the next transform, or processing ends due to the transformbeing the last to be applied to the notification. Various transformswill now be described, followed by a description of how the category ofthe notification affects which transforms are applied.

FIG. 6 illustrates a muted transform method 600, which performs a singleact of setting a check mute flag in the internal processing format ofthe notification (act 601). Muting a notification means that thenotification is intentionally silenced by not being deliveredimmediately, if delivered at all. If the check mute flag is not set,then the notification will not be muted. If the check mute flag is set,then it is possible that the notification will be muted depending on theresults from the user profile transform described with respect to FIG.7.

FIG. 7 illustrates a user profile transform method 700, which begins bygetting the user profile (act 701) associated with the sender of thenotification (if a mobile-originated notification) or associated withthe receiver of the notification (if a mobile-terminated notification).This user profile may have an identifier that is specific to the user,or an identifier that is specific to a device of the user.

If the check mute flag is not set (NO in decision block 702), then theuser profile information is added to the internal processing format ofthe notification (act 703). Otherwise, if the check mute flag is set(YES in decision block 702), then the transform determines whether thenotification should be muted (decision block 704). This decision isbased on the user profile information accessed from the database and/orbased on other configuration information. Muting may occur if the user'spreferences indicate that muting should occur. For example, perhaps itis 2:00 a.m. and the user has indicated that she is not to receivenotifications between the hours of 10:00 p.m. and 7:00 a.m. since shewill be asleep. Also, muting may occur due to factors other than theuser's preference.

If the muting should not occur (NO in decision block 704), then the userprofile information is added to the internal processing format of thenotification (act 703). Otherwise, if muting should occur (YES indecision block 704), then a determination is made as to whether thenotification should be delivered at all (decision block 705). Thisdetermination may also be made from the user profile informationobtained from the database lookup. If delivery is not to occur (NO indecision block 705), then the notification is dropped (act 706).Otherwise, if delivery is to occur (YES in decision block 705), then thenotification is sent to the deferral service 503 for subsequent delivery(act 707).

FIG. 8 illustrates an authorization transform method 800 in which it isdetermined whether or not the user is authorized to receive or send thenotification. First, the user profile information is consulted todetermine whether or not the user's account has been disabled (decisionblock 801). For example, the carrier may have disabled the user'saccount due to the user defaulting on obligations or canceling theaccount. If the account is disabled (YES in decision block 801), thenthe notification is dropped (act 802). Otherwise, if the account is notdisabled (NO in decision block 801), the user profile information isconsulted to determine whether the user is authorized to send (orreceive) the notification (decision block 803). If not authorized (NO indecision block 803), then the notification is dropped (act 802).Otherwise (YES in decision block 803), the transform ends.

FIG. 9 illustrates a message limit transform method 900, which checks tosee if any user-set or carrier-set limits are exceeded. The currentlimit information may have been obtained from the initial databaselookup performed during the user profile transform method 700. However,the limit information may also be acquired by a separate database lookupas desired. If the user is not over the limit (NO in decision block901), then the transform simply ends. If the user is over the limit (YESin decision block 901), then the transform consults the user profile todetermine if a warning has been sent (decision block 902). If a warninghas not been sent (NO in decision block 902), then a warning is sent(act 903) and then the notification is dropped (act 904). Otherwise, ifa warning has been sent (YES in decision block 902), then thenotification is simply dropped (act 904) without a warning.

FIG. 10 illustrates an application transform method 1000 in whichnotifications are generated by an external notification service. Suchexternal notification services often allow the user a mechanism imbeddedin the notification itself to respond to the notification. Based on theuser profile information, the notification service determines whetherthe notification sink is a qualified device (decision block 1001). If so(YES in decision block 1001), then the notification service provides thenotification to an external application (act 1002) for appropriatefacilitation of the external notification service. For example, perhapsthe external application would embed the mechanism for responding to thenotification into the notification itself.

If the device is not qualified (NO in decision block 1001), then thenotification is formatted for the device (act 1003). This formattingtakes into consideration the user profile information. When anotification is generated by an external notification service, and thedestination device is not compatible with using the full features ofthat notification service, there may be unnecessary fields within thenotification that were intended to facilitate the full features of theexternal notification service. Accordingly, formatting the notificationfor the destination device (act 1003) may embody removing those fields.This may be viewed as preliminary formatting.

FIG. 11 illustrates a formatting transform method 1100 that translatesthe notification into a format that is acceptable for the destinationdevice. If the user profile information indicates that the user wouldlike the notification split up (YES in decision block 1101) if it is toobig, then while the notification is still too big, the transform finds abreak point in the notification (act 1102) and sends the fragment as anew notification (act 1103). Otherwise (NO in decision block 901), thenotification is truncated to fit the user's device (act 1104).

In one embodiment, the size of the message fragment is determined by theleast allowable fragment size taking into account all hops from thenotification service to the notification sink. For example, take thecase where the notification service first sends the notification to thecarrier thus constituting the first hop. Then, the carrier forwards thenotification to the wireless device thus constituting the second hop.Suppose that the fragment size allowed by the second hop from thecarrier to the wireless device is smaller than the fragment size allowedby the first hop from the notification service to the carrier. Thetransform would use the fragment size allowed by the second hop from thecarrier to the wireless devices in finding the break point in thenotification.

FIG. 12 illustrates an advertisement transform method 1200. It is firstdetermined whether or not there is an advertisement available (decisionblock 1201). The notification service 203 may make this determination byconsulting with the configuration database 504. If there is anadvertisement available (YES in decision block 1201), then the transformdetermines whether there is space available for the advertisement(decision block 1202). If there is space available (YES in decisionblock 1202), then the advertisement is added (act 1203) to the internalprocessing format of the notification.

Although seven specific transform methods have been described (namely,the muted, user profile, authorization, message limit, application,formatting, and advertisement transform methods), there may be othertransform methods that may be desirable to be performed depending on thecategory of the notification. The transform methods that are performeddepend on the category of the notification. In one embodiment, the typesof notifications and the transforms performed based on the notificationare defined by an XML document which is now described.

In this example XML document, line numbers are added for purposes ofclarity in describing the XML document. These line numbers would not bepresent in an actual XML document. Consider the first 17 lines of suchan XML document as follows:

1)<?xml version=“1.0” encoding=“UTF-8” ?> 2)<MobileConfig> 3) <Notifications> 4)    <TransformsAndFilters> 5)      <Router> 6)       <Process id=“1” class=“21” desc=“Authorization” /> 7)       <Process id=“2” class=“22” desc=“Muted” /> 8)        <Processid=“3” class=“23” desc=“Formatting” /> 9)        <Process id=“4”class=“24” desc=“Application” /> 10)       <Process id=“8” class=“28”desc=“User Profile” /> 11)       <Process id=“9” class=“29”desc=“Message Limit” /> 12)     </Router> 13)     <Transport>14)       <Process id=“6” class=“26” desc=“Advertisement” />15)       <Process id=“7” class=“27” desc=“Message Limit” />16)     </Transport> 17)   </TransformsAndFilters>

Line 1 identifies the document as complying with version 1.0 of theeXtenstible markup language, and specifies the encoding format of“UTF-8”. Line 2 is an opening tag of a top-tier XML element called“MobileConfig”. Line 3 is an opening tag of a second-tier XML elementcalled “MobileConfig/Notifications”. Line 4 is an opening tag of athird-tier XML element called“MobileConfig/Notifications/TransformsAndFilters” and corresponds to aclosing tag at line 17. This indicates that the content from line 5through line 16 describes available transforms for use when processingnotifications.

Line 5 is an opening tag of a fourth-tier XML element called“MobileConfig/Notifications/TransformsAndFilters/Router” and correspondsto a closing tag at line 12. Thus, the content from line 6 through line11 describes transforms that may be implemented by the routing component302. Line 6 is an XML element that assigns an identifier of 1 to theauthorization transform. Likewise, lines 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11 assigncorresponding identifiers of 2, 3, 4, 8 and 9 to the muted, formatting,application, user profile and message limit transforms, respectively.These lines also identify a class associated with each of thosetransforms.

Line 13 is an opening tag of a fourth-tier XML element called“MobileConfig/Notifications/TransformsAndFilters/Transport” andcorresponds to a closing tag at line 16. Thus, the content from line 14and line 15 describes transforms that may be implemented by the deliverytransport component 501. Line 14 is an XML element that assigns anidentifier of “6” to the advertisement transform. Line 15 is an XMLelement that assigns an identifier of “7” to the message limittransform. Note that the message limit transform may be implemented byeither the router component 302 (see line 11) or the delivery transportcomponent 501. However, the message limit transform is assigned adifferent identifier and is of a different class depending on whetherthe transform is executed by the router component 302 or the deliverytransport component 501. In this manner, the third-tier XML elementcalled “MobileConfig/Notifications/TransformsAndFilters” defines theavailable transforms, and where those transforms may be implemented.

The next portion of the XML document defines categories ofnotifications, what transforms are performed for each category, and inwhat order. Consider the following XML fragment:

18)  <Categories> 19)    <Category id=“None” desc=“Default”>20)      <TFP id=“2” /> 21)      <TFP id=“8” /> 22)      <TFP id=“1” />23)      <TFP id=“3” /> 24)      <TFP id=“7” /> 25)    </Category>

Line 18 is an opening tag of a third-tier XML element called“MobileConfig/Notifications/Categories”. Line 19 through 25 describetransforms that are to be performed by default when no notificationcategory is detected. These transforms are 2, 8, 1, 3 and 7 in order. Inother words, the router component 302 performs the muted, user profile,authorization and formatting transforms in order, followed by thedelivery transport component 501 performing the message limit transform.

Consider the following XML fragment that describes how to process anotification of the “Instant Message” category:

26)  <Category id=“110110001” desc=“Instant Message”> 27)    <TFP id=“8”/> 28)    <TFP id=“1” /> 29)    <TFP id=“4” /> 30)    <TFP id=“7” />31)  </Category>

This XML fragment indicates that the router component 302 performs theuser profile, authorization and application transforms in order,followed by the delivery transport component 501 performing the messagelimit transform.

Consider the following XML fragment that describes how to process anotification of the “Buddy List Request” category:

32)  <Category id=“110110002” desc=“Buddy List Request”> 33)    <TFPid=“8” /> 34)    <TFP id=“1” /> 35)    <TFP id=“4” /> 36)  </Category>

This XML fragment indicates that the router component 302 performs theuser profile, authorization and application transforms in order. Thedelivery transport component 501 does not perform any transforms. Thefollowing XML fragment indicates an identical transform processing orderfor Buddy List Response notifications.

37)  <Category id=“110110003” desc=“Buddy List Response”> 38)    <TFPid=“8” /> 39)    <TFP id=“1” /> 40)    <TFP id=“4” /> 41)  </Category>

Consider the following XML fragment that describes how to process anotification of the “News” category:

42)  <Category id=“111100403” desc=“News”> 43)    <TFP id=“2” />44)    <TFP id=“8” /> 45)    <TFP id=“1” /> 46)    <TFP id=“3” />47)    <TFP id=“7” /> 48)    <TFP id=“6” /> 49)  </Category>

This XML fragment indicates that the router component 302 performs themuted, user profile, authorization and formatting transforms in order,followed by the delivery transport component 501 performing the messagelimit and advertisement transforms in order.

Consider the following XML fragment that describes how to process anotification of the “External Application” category as when an externalapplication generates an alert designed for the recipient to be able torespond to:

50)  <Category id=“111100406” desc=“External Application”> 51)    <TFPid=“2” /> 52)    <TFP id=“8” /> 53)    <TFP id=“1” /> 54)    <TFP id=“4”/> 55)    <TFP id=“7” /> 56)  </Category>

This XML fragment indicates that the router component 302 performs themuted, user profile, authorization, and application transforms in order,followed by the delivery transport component 501 performing the messagelimit transform.

Consider the following XML fragment that describes how to process anotification of the “MessageLimit” category:

57)  <Category id=“111100407” desc=“MessageLimit”> 58)    <TFP id=“8” />59)    <TFP id=“1” /> 60)  </Category>

Such a message limit notification may be, for example, the warning sentin act 903 of FIG. 9. This XML fragment indicates that the routercomponent 302 performs the user profile and authorization transforms inorder.

The following XML fragment identifies similar transform processing fornotifications that are authorization codes, as when as user is providingauthentication information to the notification service.

61)  <Category id=“111100408” desc=“AuthCode”> 62)    <TFP id=“8” />63)    <TFP id=“1” /> 64)  </Category>The following indicates a transform order when processing notificationidentified as mobile-originated.

65)  <Category id=“111100450” desc=“Mobile-originated Message”>66)    <TFP id=“8” /> 67)    <TFP id=“9” /> 68)  </Category>

In the case of mobile-originated message, the router component 302performs the user profile and message limit transforms in order.

The following XML fragment identifies the transform order when thenotification is of the category “all” indicating that all of thetransforms are to be performed.

69)     <Category id=“100000000” desc=“All”> 70)       <TFP id=“2” />71)       <TFP id=“8” /> 72)       <TFP id=“1” /> 73)       <TFP id=“3”/> 74)       <TFP id=“7” /> 75)       <TFP id=“6” /> 76)     </Category>

In this case, the router component 302 would perform the muted, userprofile, authorization and formatting transforms in order, followed bythe delivery transport component 501 performing the message limit andadvertisement transforms in order. The following XML fragment completesthe XML document.

77)     </Categories> 76)   </Notifications> 77) </MobileConfig>

Line 75 is the closing tag corresponding to the opening tag on line 18.Thus, lines 18 through 75 represent a third-tier XML element called“MobileConfig/Notifications/Categories” that describes the transformprocessing performed for various notification categories.

Line 76 is a closing tag corresponding to the opening tag on line 3.Thus, lines 3 through 76 represent a second-tier XML element called“MobileConfig/Notifications” that describes notification configurationinformation.

Line 77 is a closing tag corresponding to the opening tag on line 2,thus completing the top-tier XML element called “MobileConfig”. It willbe apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art, after having reviewedthis description, that the XML document may be extended as desired toinclude a variety of information that may be less relevant to theprinciples of the present invention.

From the above-description, it is apparent that the notification service203 may perform appropriate transform processing on a variety ofdifferent types of notifications. Should a new type of notificationarise, one may use the principles described herein to define a newnotification category and describe a transform order to perform onnotifications of that category. Thus, the notification service 203efficiently scales to a wide variety of different notification types.

The notification service 203 also may scale in the number of rawnotifications and users that may be accommodated. Note that thenotification service has been compartmentalized to include a listeningcomponent 301, a router component 302, and a delivery component 303 suchas a delivery transport component 501. FIG. 13 illustrates a scalingmechanism that may used to scale the notification service in accordancewith the principles of the present invention, so that the number of eachtype of components may be efficiently adjusted to accommodate forcurrent workloads.

Referring to FIG. 13 are two modules of type A, namely module A1 andmodule A2. Each of the A modules perform identical processing. There arethree modules of type B, namely module B1, module B2 and module B3. Eachof the B modules also performs identical processing with respect to eachother. A notification may first be processed at one of the A modulesfollowed by being processed at one of the B modules. The processing of anotification is stateless, such that it does not matter which of the Amodules processes the notification, and which of the B modules processesthe notification after the A modules.

Each of the A modules has an outgoing queue (e.g., a MICROSOFT® MSMQ).For example, module A1 has an outgoing queue A1 i, and module A2 has anoutgoing queue A2 i. The outgoing queue is an asynchronous backgroundprocess that facilitates the orderly transfer of queued items from theoutgoing queue to a load balancer 1301. The load balancer 1301determines which of the B modules to send the notification to. The loadbalancer then provides the notification to the appropriate incomingqueue. For example, module B1 has an incoming queue B1 i, module B2 hasan incoming queue B2 i, and module B3 has an incoming queue B3 i. In oneembodiment, the TCP/IP protocol set may be used to communicate from theoutgoing queue to the incoming queue.

FIG. 14 shows the affect of applying the load balancing aspects of FIG.13 to the delivery component, the router component, and the deliverytransport component of FIG. 5. Note that a number of delivery componentsA1 through A5, router components B1 through B5 and delivery transportcomponents C1 through C5 are illustrated. The number of each type ofcomponent may be adjusted as needed.

FIG. 15 illustrates a flowchart of a method 1500 for deliveringnotifications from a notification source to a notification sink. Themethod includes a step for translating the notification so as to beprocessed by the notification service in a scalable fashion (step 1501).This functional result-oriented step includes any corresponding acts foraccomplishing this result. In the illustrated embodiment, this stepincludes corresponding acts 1502, 1503 and 1504.

In particular, the notification service receives a notification from thenotification source in a network format using a listener component ofone or more listener components (act 1502). As mentioned previously,this network format may be, for example, an HTTP post request with thenotification content being structure in an XML document that is eitherincluded directly in the body of the HTTP post message, or else isincluded within a SOAP message that is within the body of the HTTP postmessage.

The listener component translates the notification from the networkformat into an internal processing format used by the notificationservice (act 1503). The listener component then places the notificationin its internal processing format into a corresponding outgoing queue(act 1504). That outgoing queue may be selected by the load balancingassociated with the listener component such that the notification issent to an appropriate router component when considering the currentworkloads of all of the available router components.

The method 1500 then includes the functional, result-oriented step forprocessing the notification in a scalable fashion (act 1505). Althoughthis may include any corresponding acts for accomplishing thisfunctional step, the illustrated embodiments shows the step 1505 asincluding corresponding acts 1506, 1507 and 1508.

Specifically, a routing component of one or more routing componentsreceives the notification from the outgoing queue corresponding to thelistener component at a corresponding incoming queue (act 1506). Then,the routing component determines a delivery component to route thenotification to of one or more delivery components (act 1507). Therouting component then places the notification in a correspondingoutgoing queue (act 1508).

The delivery component then receives the notification and delivers thenotification to the notification sink (act 1509). It should be notedthat if the notification sink is a local application as may be the caseif the notification is a mobile-originated notification, the deliverycomponent may be a local delivery module or even an Application ProgramInterface (API). However, in the case of mobile-terminatednotifications, the delivery module may be, for example, one of thedelivery transport modules 501.

Accordingly, the principles of the present invention allow for widevariety of notification to be processed appropriately using a set of oneor more operations or transforms. In addition, the notification servicein accordance with the present invention efficiently scales asappropriate to the raw number of notifications and users serviced.

The present invention may be embodied in other specific forms withoutdeparting from its spirit or essential characteristics. The describedembodiments are to be considered in all respects only as illustrativeand not restrictive. The scope of the invention is, therefore, indicatedby the appended claims rather than by the foregoing description. Allchanges which come within the meaning and range of equivalency of theclaims are to be embraced within their scope.

1. A notification service system in a network environment comprised ofone or more computers or devices such as mobile devices that serve asnotification sources, meaning that such computer or devices serve assources where notifications are generated in response to an event, suchnotifications being generated in a network format comprised of an XMLdocument included within an HTTP post request or included within a SOAPmessage that is included within an HTTP post request, and wherein thenetwork is also comprised of one or more computers or devices that serveas notification sinks, meaning that such computer or devices serve asdestinations on the network where the generated notifications are to besent, the notification service system comprising: at least oneprocessor; and at least one storage media storing a listener component,a routing component and a delivery component that are configured toimplement, with the at least one processor, a method for delivering thenotifications from a notification service that scales the notificationsto the number and variety of notification sources and notification sinksat the time such notifications are generated and delivered, wherein themethod comprises: (a) receiving, at the listening component, anotification generated by a notification source in a network formatcomprised of an XML document included within an HTTP post request,notification content of the notification being structured within the XMLdocument that identifies data including a category of notification andtransform operations associated with the category that may be performedon notifications of the particular category; (b) translating thenotification into an internal processing format; (c) forwarding thetranslated notification to the routing component where categorizationsof notifications that may be received are stored in an XML configurationdocument wherein each of the categories has associated transformoperations that may be performed for that category; (d) referencing theconfiguration XML document at the router component to determine acategory associated with the notification, and performing at the routercomponent one or more of the associated transform operations on thenotification content of the XML document; (e) forwarding thenotification from the routing component to the delivery component fordelivery to the notification sinks of the network; (f) changing the XMLconfiguration document at the router by adding or deleting nodes of theXML document to add or delete different categories of notifications, andediting transform operations consistent with the added or deletedcategories; and (g) repeating parts (a) through (e) for any subsequentnotification corresponding to the changed categories of notifications.2. The notification service system of claim 1, wherein the methodfurther comprises a step for scaling the notification service in orderto take into account the changes in the number of notification sourcesor notification sinks on the network, the scaling being performed by,providing the listener, routing and delivery components of thenotification service with a plurality of identical modules forperforming the functions of the listener, routing and deliverycomponents; providing each of the listener, routing and deliverycomponents with a load balancing function that distributes a receivednotification to one of the modules of that component; and changing thenumber of modules at one or more of the listener, routing and deliverycomponents in order to take into account changes in the number ofnotifications sources or notification sinks on the network.
 3. Thenotification service system of claim 1, wherein the listener componentof the notification service receives the notification from a wirelessdevice.
 4. The notification service system of claim 3, wherein themethod further comprises: an act of delivering the notification to amobile service provider.
 5. The notification service system of claim 1,wherein the listener component of the notification service receives thenotification from a mobile service provider.
 6. The notification servicesystem of claim 5, wherein the method further comprises: an act ofdelivering the notification to a wireless device.
 7. The notificationservice system of claim 1, wherein the act of referencing theconfiguration XML document at the router component to determine acategory associated with the notification comprises: determining thatthe notification is an instant message.
 8. The notification servicesystem of claim 1, wherein the act of referencing the configuration XMLdocument at the router component to determine a category associated withthe notification comprises the following: an act of failing to detectany category associated with the notification; and an act of determiningthat the notification is of a default category based on the failure todetect any category associated with the notification.
 9. Thenotification service system of claim 1, wherein the act of referencingthe configuration XML document at the router component to determine acategory associated with the notification comprises: determining thatthe notification is a buddy list related notification.
 10. Thenotification service system of claim 1, wherein the act of referencingthe configuration XML document at the router component to determine acategory associated with the notification comprises: determining thatthe notification is a news related notification.
 11. The notificationservice system of claim 1, wherein the act of referencing theconfiguration XML document at the router component to determine acategory associated with the notification comprises: determining thatthe notification is a mobile-originated notification.
 12. Thenotification service system of claim 1, wherein the act of performingone or more transform operations on the notification content based onthe category associated with the notification comprises: determiningwhether to check that the notification should be muted.
 13. Thenotification service system of claim 1, wherein the act of performingone or more transform operations on the notification content based onthe category associated with the notification comprises: accessing auser profile associated with a sender or receiver of the notification.14. The notification service system of claim 1, wherein the act ofperforming one or more transform operations on the notification contentbased on the category associated with the notification comprises:authenticating the notification by verifying whether a user account isdisabled or authorized.
 15. The notification service system of claim 1,wherein the act of performing one or more transform operations on thenotification content based on the category associated with thenotification comprises: inserting an advertisement into thenotification.
 16. The notification service system of claim 1, whereinthe act of performing one or more transform operations on thenotification content based on the category associated with thenotification comprises: formatting the notification for the destinationdevice.
 17. The notification service system of claim 1, wherein the actof performing one or more transform operations on the notificationcontent based on the category associated with the notificationcomprises: determining whether a user has exceeded a message limit. 18.The notification service system of claim 1, wherein the act ofperforming one or more transform operations on the notification contentbased on the category associated with the notification comprises:determining the transform operations to perform based on the category.19. The notification service system of claim 18, wherein the methodfurther comprises an act of determining the order of operations toperform based on the category.